In conclusion it may be added, that The New Europe, of London, though by no means a Bohemian or a Slavic magazine, has paid generous attention to Bohemian questions as affected by the war. Among the collaborators of The New Europe are such able students of Austrian politics as Thomas G. Masaryk, late Professor at the Bohemian University of Prague, Dr. R. W. Seton-Watson of King’s College and H. Wickham Steed of the London Times.
Plans, Maps. etc. Of especial interest to the students of American Colonial history is the Map of Virginia and Maryland this present Year 1670 Surveyed and Exactly Drawne by the Only Labour and Endeavour of Augustin Herrman, Bohemiensis. A copy of this rare map is on file in the Library of Congress in Washington.[11] In addition to the Map of Maryland, Herrman made a sketch of New Amsterdam (New York) as that city looked in 1650. Herrman is reputed to be the first Bohemian immigrant to America, coming here in 1633. On the site of the former Bohemia Manor in Cecil County, Maryland, there is still preserved a tombstone bearing this inscription: “Avgvstine Herrmen Bohemian The First Fovnder Seater of Bohemea Manner Anno 1661.” Like Wenceslaus Hollar, John Amos Komenský, Paul Skála ze Zhoře, (the historian) and thousands of other Protestants, Herrman, the son of a minister of the gospel, was forced to flee from Bohemia after the overthrow of the Protestants there.
Politics and War Publications. Publication has received an unwonted impetus from the war. Never since the Thirty Years’ War have the grievances and political aspirations of the Bohemians been given more widespread publicity. Woodrow Wilson stated the situation precisely in one of his books when he declared that “no lapse of time, no defeat of hopes, seems sufficient to reconcile the Czechs of Bohemia to incorporation with Austria.” Since 1848, the year which saw the dawn of constitutionalism in the Hapsburg monarchy, the Bohemians have been asking for home rule; the lessons of war at once suggested a bolder program, a new orientation. Presently their leaders demand a separation from Austria and the inclusion in an independent Bohemian State of the Slovaks of Hungary. Under this subtitle the reader will find indexed articles by opponents (Heilprin) as well as by well-wishers. Of the new orientation, that is, of a Bohemian-Slovak State, free and independent, the leading intellect outside of Bohemia is Professor Masaryk, temporarily an exile in England.
Thomas Garrigue Masaryk (the middle name is assumed from that of his American wife, Miss Charlotte Garrigue of New York) is writing his name large in what posterity will joyfully call Bohemian Emancipation. Masaryk was born of humble Moravian-Slovak parentage in 1850. From the time he entered public life, he was always a rebel, though in the finest sense of the term; rebel in politics, rebel in literature, rebel in the manner he interpreted Bohemian nationalism. That he was not summarily removed from the chair he occupied in the Prague University was due to fear of the man, to fear of his large following, and not to the want of powerful accusers or because of scruples on the part of the government. In native literature and politics alike, Masaryk’s activities are bound to leave a deep mark. Fortunately for the cause, he was able to effect his escape from Austria in the early stages of the war.
An able writer and a forceful advocate of Bohemia’s cause in the United States is Charles Pergler, vice-president of the Bohemian National Alliance in America.
Prague. Von Humboldt was not the only traveler who thought that the capital of the Bohemian Kingdom was the most beautiful inland town of all Europe. American and English tourists who have visited the city all concur in the opinion of von Humboldt. “Prague to a Bohemian,” to quote Arthur Symons (Harper’s Magazine, Sept., 1901), “is the epitome of the history of his country; he sees it as the man sees the woman he loves, with her first beauty.” Lützow’s Story of Prague will fully repay the reader who would like to know more of this beautiful mediæval city.
Sociology and Economics. The theme of Slavic immigration to America within the last twenty-five years has been considered by politicians, settlement workers, immigration “specialists,” professional labor agitators and others. The caption of Alois B. Koukol’s article in The Charities and Commons, A Slav’s a Man for A’ That, sums up the situation precisely. Yes, the American Slav is a man, for all that has been said about him—chiefly against him—by professional labor agitators; but it took the Great War to demonstrate his utility to America. No economist has written of him with greater sympathy, understanding and tact than Emily Greene Balch, teacher at Wellesley College. To get a more accurate perspective on the subject, Miss Balch went to the source, to their homelands to observe Our Slavic Fellow Citizens.
Sokols. The “Sokol Union” (Sokol in Bohemian means falcon, a bird typical of strength and fearlessness) is, or rather was, until the Great War, the most powerful non-political organization in Bohemia. Suspecting its members of disloyalty, the authorities in the first stages of the war, dissolved it. Miroslav Tyrš and Henry Fügner founded the “Sokol Union” in 1862. Body culture is the primary though not the sole aim of the society; considered from its ethical aspect the “Sokol Union” contemplates nothing less than the moral and physical regeneration of the Bohemian race. From Bohemia the Sokol idea has gradually found its way into other Slav countries, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Bulgaria and there are Sokols, men and women, even in America.
Travel and Description. The old time travelers like Christian Frederick Damberger, Georg Robert Gleig, Johann Georg Keysler, Johann Georg Kohl, described not the kingdom of the Čechs, but Bohemia, the Province of Austria. After 1621 Bohemia ceased to exist as an independent state and the veneer of Teutonism thickened from year to year. So complete seemed the denationalization of Bohemia in the eighteenth century and even in the first part of the nineteenth, that foreigners visiting the baths at Carlsbad and Marienbad were surprised to hear peasants talk in an unknown tongue. As for the real Bohemia, after she had again found herself, no English or American traveler has more trenchantly described her castles, her mediæval churches, her splendid ruins, her roads, her industries, her schools, than James Baker.